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VOL. 6, NO. 2
JANUARY 9, 2012
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History in her basement What’s ahead for 2012? Carol Evans talks urban wilderness, Battlefield Loop and more. See page A-5
Faith Promise We explore the rapid growth of Faith Promise Church. See page A-7
Linda Lee and her watercolor painting of the historic Lakeshore administration building Photo by Betty Bean
Run, Harry, run
Artist Linda Lee preserves artifacts
Should Rep. Harry Tindell run in new district? See page A-5
By Betty Bean
FEATURED COLUMNIST DR. BOB COLLIER
Standing out in a crowd Cranes find safe haven in Hiwassee See page A-6
Photograph of President Franklin D. Roosevelt’s 1940 visit to Knoxville (from the Bearden Museum collection)
From ‘the hole’ to the hardwood
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Marco Harris is the student-athlete welfare coordinator for the UT men’s basketball team. He checks attendance by showing up at players’ classes in a golf cart and has character-building meetings with the team every Sunday. He also teaches the players life skills, like how to tie a tie and balance a checkbook. He’s good at what he does because he’s passionate about helping kids. He knows how tough it is for young athletes to transition from high-school stardom to college and how important it is for them to be prepared for a life that most likely won’t include professional sports. “That ball will quit bouncing. After the fourth year, they’re out into the real world,” he says. He also knows what it’s like to navigate the road from an inner-city housing project to a successful career. Harris and his childhood friend coach Cuonzo Martin grew up
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Working from a photograph hardly bigger than a postage stamp, artist Linda Lee painstakingly recreated the image of the administration building at Lakeshore Mental Health Institute as it looked when it opened in 1886. If she needed additional inspiration, all she had to do was look out her studio window at the Lakeshore campus, just across Fort Loudoun Lake behind her home. She labored over the project for a year, meticulously rendering every architechtural de-
tail, every wooden Victorian filigree on the building’s facade. The idea for the watercolor painting came about several years ago when Lakeshore’s director, Lee Thomas, stopped by Parker Brothers Hardware, the iconic business founded by Lee’s grandfather, Lloyd Parker, and his brothers in 1923. Originally downtown on Walnut Street, Parker Brothers moved to Bearden in 1955, setting up shop on Forest Park Drive in an area then known as the “End of Town.” Lee and her husband, Chuck, took it over in 1980 and in 1993 moved a couple of blocks west on Kingston Pike to an old Shoney’s that they repurposed. Wherever it was located, Parker Brothers was a Knoxville landmark and community gathering spot, and during the Lees’ tenure, one of its many attractions was the “Bearden Museum,” a collection of historic documents, pictures and memorabilia on display there. Linda Lee’s art work, much of which reflected her interest in local history and her love of old buildings, caught Lee Thomas’ attention. “I told her I’d love to have someone do a painting of Lakeshore, and she undertook to do this rendering of the administration building and did a wonderful job of capturing it,” Thomas said. “She took it on and over time kept bringing me copies of drafts; she was never satisfied with what she did, even though it captures the building very accurately. Finally, they brought me not only the original, but 10 copies.” Originally, Thomas had hoped the nonprofit “Friends of Lakeshore” could sell prints of Lee’s painting to raise money for the benefits of the patients there. “Just a few weeks later, I get the news that they are closing the hospital, so the whole purpose of this has changed around,” Thomas said. The fate of the Lakeshore painting isn’t the only thing Linda Lee’s concerned about, however. The Bearden Museum has resided in her basement since she and Chuck retired in 2005. She says she’d love to see it find a permanent home.
together on the streets of East St. Louis, Ill. “I tell everybody I raised him, but he’d probably tell a different story,” he laughs. Without the love of his family, and the mentoring of a teacher, Harris thinks he might have ended up like most of his other friends – on drugs, in jail or dead. That’s why he’s willing to share his story to help recruit mentors for Amachi Knoxville, a Knoxville Leadership Foundation program that matches mentors with children whose parents are in jail. Harris and Martin were raised in “the hole,” a nickname for the Norman E. Owens housing project. It was a neighborhood infested with gangs and drugs, yet Harris says he loves it, because it made him who he is today. He was the third child of a single mother, and, at one time, there were 13 family members sharing his threebedroom home. The neighborhood was like a village, he says, and if he did something
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Marco Harris, student-athlete welfare coordinator for the UT men’s basketball team, grew up in an East St. Louis housing project with coach Cuonzo Martin. Harris says he owes his survival to his family and a teacher who served as a mentor. Photo by Wendy Smith wrong, he might get a spanking from Martin’s mom and another from his own mother when he got home. Like most of his peers, Harris eventually joined a gang. He made some mistakes, he says, but he didn’t want to let his family down, and that kept him out of serious trouble. He was also influenced by an art teacher, Homer Simmons, who took the time to see the good in him. The
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teacher was one of only a few who were willing to tell Harris when he was wrong, in spite of the fact that he was a star on the Lincoln High School basketball team, which won three state titles in a row. Simmons also served as a role model for his students. “He had a house and a Benz, and he was doing everything legal.” It took Harris years to fully realize Simmons’ impact on his life, but when
January is national mentoring month, and Knoxville Leadership Foundation will kick off its campaign to recruit 75 mentors in 75 days with “Breaking the Cycle,” 6-8 p.m. Thursday, Jan. 19, at the Knoxville Museum of Art. Marco Harris will be the keynote speaker. The event is free and open to the public. Info: questions@klf.org or 524-2774.
he did, he gave his former teacher a call. “I’m very appreciative of what I have now,” he says. “If I could do it all again, I’d take the same path. I’ve learned to treat everybody the same and respect everybody.”
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